5 Cs

The 5 Cs of Singapore!

"Nearly one in every six households has more than $1 million in assets, making it the densest population of wealthy households in the world."

Cash. Singapore Dollar. 1 SGD = 0.6 EURO. You need cash in this city. Often times you can't pay with debit card and it's essential in every day life. In Holland I don't use much cash, but here I find myself going to the machine quite often.

Car. Cars cost twice the amount as in Europe, because you have to pay an initial fee of around $50K to have the right to drive a car in Singapore. Import taxes are very high as well so a lot of Singaporeans choose not to drive. Then on the other end of the spectrum you have the people with too much money. I live in a area where I see Ferraris, Lambos, and other gorgeous cars drive by on a daily basis.

Credit Card. You earn the money, you spend it on the same day. It's very important to showcase a cushy lifestyle and enjoy life. A lot of people do fall into the credit card trap, even as early as in university (just like US loans) so I often wonder whether the "rich" have the actual money/liquidity or are buying everything on credit.

Condominium. Near Orchard Road, where all the gorgeous high buildings are, you need to pay around $5K a month and then you have a small condo, but one in a prestigious building! Most Singaporeans live in government-sponsored HDB flats which are the same size as condos, but half the price. Only as a Singaporean resident may you apply for such housing.

Country Club. Only after you have obtained the previous four status symbols, may you enter the fifth circle of wealth aka the country club with its exclusive privileges. My Swiss friend tried to convince me that the Swiss Country Club in Singapore owns the most land, but I haven't been able to verify this statement.


Not surprisingly...

"With this wealthy population comes a relatively high cost of living. In a 2010 cost-of-living survey of 214 cities by consulting firm Mercer, Singapore is the 11th most expensive city in the world for expatriates, on a par with Oslo and more expensive than New York City."

Nature

I went on a hike with Ivo in the Bukit Timah Reserve. This climb involved the highest mountain in Singapore; we started at 30 m above sea level and walked up to 163.63 m above sea level. It didn't feel like we were in Singapore anymore, but in a real forest.

Monkeys! About 3-4 m away from us a family of monkeys was jumping from tree to tree. One of them was carrying a baby monkey which was really cute. Though at one point they came a bit too close and I decided to continue walking b/c the prescribed distance between humans and monkeys is 2-3 m.

Gorgeous views.

Fishies

I did yet another activity from my bucket list; I went to a fish reflexology spa. Basically the fish are somehow (magically) attracted to your feet and eat the dead skin cells. Afterwards your feet are supposed to feel very soft and the best result is achieved after 3 hours.

It tickles!!!

Let's say 10 minutes in the fish spa was enough ;)

SMU

At the Singapore Management University (SMU) I am following 5 courses. Normally exchange students take 3 courses, regular students take 4, and only those who really need 5 will do 5.*

1. Shipping Business

This course is taught by a Captain, a shipbroker, and a shipping business professional. I am learning all about ships, what kind of cargo is traded, what routes the ships are able to travel, restrictions, and a huge load of information surrounding the subject. It is quite interesting and there is a big exam at the end of the course (worth 50%).

2. Enterprise Development

A Korean professor is teaching us all about how to create a business plan and become a successful entrepreneur. We study data and apply that to real world cases in order to learn more about all the things you have to consider when creating a new business. Thankfully there's no exam; instead, the grade depends on a big group project.

3. Singapore Society

This course is taught by a retired Chinese philosphy ex-NUS professor who is specialized in Chinese philosophy and sociology. He is quite old and talks very slowly. The course material is interesting, but I feel like it needs more in-depth analysis to fully keep us awake during class. He mostly lectures to us about philosophy (this is a sociology course) and can't really keep up with a discussion. It's funny, because he asks the Singaporeans quite a few questions, but those students are shy and he mostly ends up getting international views from the exchange students. I have no clue what to expect for the exam, because there's hardly any reading material and the course comes across as a bit vague.

4. Intercultural Communication

Probably this is my favourite course so far. It's a very interactive course that doesn't require too much class preparation. During every class, 2 students give a presentation regarding a communication/cultural difference topic and great discussions ensue. It feels like a safe place to share ideas and it's great to learn about different cultures. For some reason I'm learning a lot about Indian culture! Very intriguing. (Their prata and naan is amazing haha)

5. Introduction to Psychology

Reading. Reading. Reading. This class requires a lot of reading and I have to teach my teammates parts of the chapter (and they teach me a part in return) and at the end of each lesson there's a quiz. The workload is very big and I'm not only reading, but also writing reflections, creating presentations, and doing experiments (mandatory). The content is interesting and I haven't fallen asleep while reading the huge book...yet.



Most of my classmates are very nice. Every 1 out of 6 students is an exchange student so I'm surrounded by internationals, but also do group projects with local Singaporeans. They give me advice on where to eat, what to do, and what to avoid (also important!). In general, Singaporeans are really nice. In real life they come across as very focused and sometimes they almost run me over in the MRT, because they are in such a hurry to live their hectic lifestyle!



*At Tilburg University students get 7.5 ECTS for the same course I take, but I only get 5 ECTS. :(

Altitude 1

I went to the highest open air bar in Singapore the other day with my friend Sofie. It was absolutely gorgeous - it felt like we were in the sky. The bar was located on the 63rd floor and had good drinks, great seats, and a view of Singapore at night that I'll never forget.

View from our table of Esplanade and the Singapore flyer (this one is bigger than the London Eye!)

Singapore at night.

Marina Bay Sands hotel. Singaporeans are really proud of this building, actually.

Me enjoying a glass of Merlot.

Sofie and I sitting on top of the world!

Tioman Diving Trip Part II

In total we did 5 dives. We descended at this site (called Renggis) and saw Nemo fish, cuttle fish, large fish, a fish that changed colour, and ... a turtle!!

Saturday night after 3 dives we were very tired, but I made a beach walk to fully enjoy the sunset.

We stayed at the Berjaya resort and the food buffet was amazing. The room was nice and there were great dive sites all around the island.

In this picture I'm wearing a wetsuit as we were on our way to our next dive. I really enjoyed diving. Sadly, I had some problems equalizing (=unblocking your ears), because I had the flu and it really hurts your ears when you descend. Once you got to the ocean floor it was all right and you just had to make sure your knees didn't scrape corral and you kept finning in the right direction; aka keep your body horizontal and slowly fin forwards.

I was very impressed by the jungle. I have been to Bali before, but this was much wilder. This was an amazing trip and I got to know my buddy (Veronika) a lot better as well as all the other awesome people who dove to the depths of the ocean - up to 13 m below sea level!

Tioman Diving Trip Part I

This weekend I went on a diving trip to get my PADI open water diving license and the trip took us to... Malaysia! Tioman Island is situated to the East of mainland Malaysia and it took us a 3 hr car trip and 2 hr boat ride to get there. From the pictures you can see that it's a gorgeous place!

When we got to Malaysia, we had dinner on the side of the road at this stand. You had to choose sticks with food (ranging from chicken butt pieces to pig blood to green beans to fish to various other unidentifiable things) and then the owner of the food stand would fry or cook your chosen sticks.

Durian: the fruit that smells terrible, but is SUPPOSED to taste like heaven. I suppose it tastes almost as bad as it smells, but I've been told it's a fruit you have to get used to. The texture was very strange and no one in the group finished their piece...

Illegal DVDs were being sold on the side of the road.

The group consisted of mostly exchange students (from Norway, Czech, Spain, Japan, USA, Belgium, and Holland ofc!) and one doctor.

Malaysia is so pretty!









More to come in Part II! :)